


Hang Ten

by Dark_Eyed_Junco



Category: Baseball RPF
Genre: M/M, Water Wastage, World Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-14
Updated: 2017-12-14
Packaged: 2019-02-14 14:03:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13009398
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dark_Eyed_Junco/pseuds/Dark_Eyed_Junco
Summary: Game three of the World Series, Cody Bellinger strikes out four times.





	Hang Ten

**Author's Note:**

> Warning for canon-typical, so to speak, hazing and pranking. Cody is 22 and Andre is 35. I have Andre jokingly refer to a wife in dialogue, but it is meant as a theoretical and hypothetical wife. No fidelity, fictional or otherwise, was harmed in the making of this fic. 
> 
> Very Important interview where Cody describes Andre being his ‘number one guy’ taking him underneath his wing 'going about it a different way' by 'kind of smacking you around.' http://www.latimes.com/sports/94881921-132.html
> 
> Exhibit A 'Normal Way' - https://twitter.com/eboland11/status/924498930095702016
> 
> Exhibit B 'Smacking Way' - https://twitter.com/JeffPassan/status/924518582033244160
> 
> Right? Come on! 
> 
> Other less vitally important things.
> 
> Ice cream #crushing reaching legendary status. Apparently he likes salted caramel which he credits for his strength, like some sort of modern-day Samson. https://www.instagram.com/p/BbdMVG2nRL-/?hl=en&taken-by=redturn2
> 
> Cody is undecided about the home run derby? Let's hound him constantly for a definite answer!
> 
> Cody: https://twitter.com/kengurnick/status/881283531229601792
> 
> Or just read this entire SI article: https://www.si.com/mlb/2017/10/29/cody-bellinger-world-series-slump

Like most things it began in spring training. Routine-wise nothing stood out the first few days. No one either. After ten plus years in the league Andre thought he could be forgiven for not jumping at the chance to learn the name of every bright-eyed eager little young thing that crossed his field of vision.

Sure, two or three might be called up to fill a momentary hole long enough to get one cup of coffee, but then sent down again and traded after. Or before. Or come up for September and not impress or break a bone or a brain, tear some essential ligament, destroy their one chance, gone. Have fun spending five years in the minors waiting for another. Or whatever, any one of the hundred ways a major league career dies before it really begins. Odds were not good.

But that still left the problem of what to call 'em those few spring weeks. He couldn't keep saying, _Hey, September._ It got too confusing. The kids didn't get the joke. They sat around and did this slow blink and said, _What?_ so Andre would have to repeat himself – Some gum, some seeds, a towel, can't you see my hair's wet over here – and the kid would say, plaintive, jumping up, knocking his knee into the table and sending cards and someone's tarry batting gloves hopping, _Sorry, but wait, it's not September it's spring?_

Which was funny enough in its own right but not really the point. The point was exercising a little gentle veteran privilege. The point was the rookies shouldn't sit too comfortable, in their blue shirts and blue shorts and long blue socks and flip flops (miraculously not blue) with their legs all spread and their lean bodies lounging out on foldout chairs, spitting seed husks into cups, playing hold 'em. Or lying on the couch jabbing away at one or another of those dumb mobile games – texting, sure, If Andre hears one more fucking Candy Crush sound effect – or tucked away in a corner of the clubhouse on the phone, speaking to – Mom? about not getting his hopes? Up too high?

Maybe not that last time. But the others for sure. Seeds. Gum. Towel. Mostly harmless but, to be honest, another one of the many forms hazing takes, like the rookie dress up day they were trying to ban. Dig down and forget that bonding stuff and it was about power. He liked having it; he liked to use it; he liked to watch for the small telltale signs – the half sigh, the tiny resentful pause, the slight upward pupil trajectory of a suppressed eye roll – all the things that added spice to yet another spring in Arizona.

Except there was one guy who didn't react right. No matter how often Andre gave him a hard time, at the most inconvenient times possible, this kid just wouldn't react the right way. Never any visible irritation at all. Instead he was obliging to a fault, almost playful, like he was having too much fun to care, like whatever burning core of joy he had for the game remained completely pure and unsullied from, by way of example, ten years of hotel rooms and jet lag and blind umps and injuries and inevitable interpersonal drama and slumps and unceremonious playoff exits all adding up to those days when, contrary to popular romanticism, actually, you don't want to go to the park.

Annoying.

So finally he asked A-gon, “Who's the kid?” with a jerk of his thumb.

A-gon looked. A-gon said, “He was at camp last year too, you don't remember?”

Andre made an impatient, What do you think? motion with his hand.

“Cody Bellinger.”

**

Joke was on Andre though, because he ended up injuring himself before the season started, again. Or, not so much an injury like last year – ball meet bat, ball meet leg, ball wins – but more his body deciding to fail him in general. His back in specific. Being a back injury, it involved a lot of steroid shots and lying on the ground feeling sorry for himself.

While he was busy doing that, Cody got called up, in May, not September, and quickly made a name for himself. You only had to bring him close to a ball and it would be falling over itself to leap out of the confines of the park. Any park. The worst hitter's park in the world. Personally, Andre thought the balls were juiced this year, but that might just be jealousy from having to watch from the sidelines.

Which he did a bit of. He stopped by the park not just for rehab, but also when he got tired of sitting alone at home with nothing to do and no one to keep him company. Gradually he built up a more complete awareness of Cody, as a person, a teammate, and a major leaguer. Cody was gangly from a distance but more substantial up close where his height masked his build less. Sponsors currying his favor was still novel and delightful to him; every unboxing was an event that needed to be shared, willingly or not, with anyone in earshot. He received Stance socks, cleats, cups, sliding shorts, shin guards, elbow guards, soft sweat bands, compression shirts, batting gloves. But not just gear, also duffel bags, caps, hoodies, boxers. One day an entire swooshed wardrobe arrived. Cody loved new shoe smell. He wasn't sure who Jerry Seinfeld was, to Bmac's hyperbolic despair. The summer was hot and Cody liked ice cream, so he ate it at his locker and in the clubhouse, before batting practice, after batting practice, after games even, just really massive quantities of dairy in his face at all times.

And during batting practice all he seemed to want to do was put on a show, hitting bombs into the stands, one after another. Not much for working on his oppo-field approach, this guy. Which Andre could understand. Why mess with such a sweet swing? The whole season Cody steadfastly remained immune to the stereotypical rookie adjustment slump. So get some lift, have some fun, be what felt like the 50th consecutive Dodger rookie to perform in the home run derby, why not. Good for him. It actually lifted Andre's spirits to hear the crack of the bat and see all those balls soaring off majestically into the clear blue sky of the ravine. Staying jealous was difficult in the face of Cody's obliviously enthusiastic clubhouse presence.

Around July Andre started to make progress after weeks of setbacks. The back was more debilitating than the leg. At least with the leg he had still been able to lift weights, throw, anything upper body, and the mending had been slow but visible and thus trackable. No such luck with a back injury. Finally, though, he was ready to start playing baseball. First up was two rehab stints in August, close to home in Rancho and then in Tusla, both served alongside unwilling Cody Bellinger catalyst and fellow back sufferer Adrian Gonzalez, though unlike Andre this was somehow A-gon's first DL experience in his entire career at the ripe ripe old age of 35. Plus he still had all his hair. Fucking iron man.

And then it was September.

**

So alright, it was funny. Guess who ended up being the September call up? Surprise! Andre Ethier. He could see the humor in the situation and poke fun at himself, if only because the long road back was over. He still had 'it' – mental toughness, physical strength. He could still contribute. No one knew better than Andre the importance of a veteran left hander off the bench in the chess match of a late innings National League game.

First order of business was getting his gear sorted out, amenities up with the big club being vastly superior to what was available in Tusla. He had shoes cleaned, tasked a clubbie to do his dry cleaning, another to mend a patch in the seat of his pants, went to check that his bat orders were still current. All the actual Dodgers uniforms Majestic had tailored to his liking in spring training were brand new and waiting for him. Made him feel like a new man.

In fact it felt like it was still spring, like they had just broken camp. His clock was all messed up; he hadn't played in any major-league games yet or been a real part of the what do you call it, camaraderie, of what was looking like a 100 win clubhouse. So his instinct on seeing Cody that first day back was to treat him like they were still back at spring training: a barked order. “Hey, Cody, pick my cleats up from Alex's and bring 'em here.” Then he realized, shit, he couldn't treat Cody like that anymore, but by then Cody had already turned away without complaint and with every indication that he was going to do as asked.

So Andre had to scoot after him to apologize – the clubhouse was hopping with some loud music – but Cody had a headstart and a long stride, so by the time Andre caught him up he was already at the long table by Alex's office . There were five pairs of cleats lined up in a neat row. He put his hands right on Andre's, these spiffy New Balances with a blue suede trim, and brought them over. “Here,” he said, pleasantly.

Leaving Andre – speechless, for some reason, clutching his fucking pristine custom New Balance cleats to his chest and looking at Cody Bellinger's back walking away from him. The same question kept running through his head: how did Cody pick Andre's shoes out of a lineup like that, so quickly, without any hesitation.

After that, Andre had no choice but to push the limits and see just how far it went.

Except no, not really. It was more like suddenly that was their _dynamic_. It wasn't so much that Andre wanted Cody running his errands for him 24/7. But they had been assigned lockermates and there was the cleat incident that first day back and then – again, seemingly all at once and of a sudden – it was like Cody decided that they were friends. In the clubhouse he was always around. Hanging around. Hovering. Andre would go to grab a pre-game sandwich and guess who decided he was also hungry. Andre took a nap and when he woke up Cody would be sitting nearby, with his earphones in or playing on his phone. Andre took batting practice and Cody was there watching, every single time.

Every single time!

They made small talk, or Cody would ask questions about upcoming pitchers, or so-and-so ump's strike zone to lefties, or what the postseason atmosphere was like, or what it was like to build a life in LA. He paid rapt attention to Andre's old war stories. And, okay, it was flattering. Andre had never had such a talented rookie attach themselves to him quite like this before. But still. Sometimes Cody didn't even want to talk. He would just be there, quietly. And then Andre would have to manufacture an excuse to send him off, if only to get some damned space to hear himself think for once.

It got to the point where, getting ready to go onto the field for warmups, he unthinkingly said, “Cody, go get my glove,” and everyone stopped dead and looked at him. Cody included. There was a moment of silence. “Jesus, you'd think I asked him to touch my wife,” he said, loudly, and everyone laughed and forgot about it, though for some of them the joke might not have been too far off the mark.

Cody didn't laugh though; he blushed. His whole face flamed up. Andre was looking right at him and could track its progress right up to the tips of his ears. Cody hastily dropped his eyes and scrambled away. The blush had reached the back of his neck.

By the time Cody came out onto the field with the glove the blush was gone except for maybe twin ruined remnants lingering on in the high parts of his cheek. On his way to Andre his feet dragged and when he reached to hand over the glove there fluttered an odd, uncharacteristic shyness or hesitancy there too. Their fingertips brushed. Like he'd been ready and primed for it, all the color came flooding back into Cody's cheeks.

Well.

A few days later Andre arrived at the park before the game. Business as usual, but a sense of unease like there was something misplaced started to grow in him. He didn't put his finger on it until he caught himself looking up at the sound of Roberts walking by. He was, he realized, waiting for someone. Specifically, Cody. Where was that guy?

Andre's keen clubhouse sense brought him to the player's lounge, which was suspiciously quiet for this time of day. It was a feeling like an empty church, almost reverent, and upon walking inside there was Cody, fast asleep on the big sofa in the middle of the room. People slept there all the time, but never with this amount of consideration shown to their rest. The music was off. Guys were talking, but quietly.

Cody looked peaceful. His head was tilted outwards and downwards. One arm was across his chest holding onto his shoulder and the other was off the sofa, knuckles a brush away from touching the carpet. His left leg was up knee resting against the back cushions. About ninety percent of his inner thigh was visible. Like all the white guys he had a baseball player's terrible tan lines – arms and neck only.

And Andre got it, sure. Postseason was right around the corner; they might play all the way to November; the team needed everyone at 100%. Late season rookie fatigue was a thing. But looking at Cody he felt a complex, stinging welter of emotions. This tired kid and his painfully transparent crush. Andre perched himself on the armrest and gave himself some time to fight the feeling down. “Hey,” he said, rapping Cody's forehead smartly. “On your feet, soldier.”

With one great sigh, Cody woke. He swung his legs around to the ground and his upper body loomed upright with a swift suddenness. He blinked sleepily at Andre.

Andre smiled at him. “No slacking, buddy,” he said. “C'mon, time for practice.”

**

It took two weeks of being trotted out to the on-deck circle just to be recalled – a decoy, as he referred to himself to the press with a certain amount of playful self-deprecation – before he got his first postseason start. Back in his younger, more tempestuous days it would have been hard to swallow. Now he more or less accepted it.

The game went well and even into the next day through batting practice he was feeling more than alright about it, hassling Cody on the way back into the clubhouse with a long list of baseball sins that he wasn’t actually guilty of this series, or ever really – not hustling on your groundout, watching your triple too long, etc – which he was tolerating with his usual good grace.

Wrigley's visitor facilities were less than ideal. Well, they were old and tiny. Kershaw kept complaining to anyone that would listen that last year he'd thought that they would have it remodeled by this year, wasn't there some rule you had to do both clubhouses within a year? No? Well, wasn't it terrible that there wasn't a rule then? And so on. The showers especially were too cramped to be shy in, but somehow, masked by the steam and bad singing and towels kicked carelessly to the floor, Cody managed to give him the slip for a few minutes.

Andre wouldn't be thwarted so easily; he was in appallingly high spirits and in the mood for horseplay. He waited by the shower exit until Cody came out, long after everyone else who'd wanted a quick wash had finished up. “Finally,” said Andre. “What were you doing in there?”

Cody shrugged. “Nothing. Showering.”

“Right.” Andre copied Cody’s shrug, half-teasing, and finished one last vigorous scrub between his legs, on the principle that there was nothing less comfortable than putting damp, hairy balls into clean underwear, plus, you know, jock itch, and then sent the towel to join the pile on the floor. He wanted to wipe his face and dry his hair but wouldn’t use a towel that had previously been busy mixing it up with his unmentionable. That was just good hygiene.

Cody had his own towel cinched loosely around his waist. Presently, it tried to make a break for freedom down over his hips; he grabbed it just in time to keep it from unraveling. Then he tried to hitch it back up. It was clearly a losing battle – really he was better off letting it fall and starting from scratch – and it reminded Andre of that afternoon in spring training where, as part of his escalating campaign to annoy Cody, he had staggered against him when they were both coming out the shower, pretended like his back was killing him and he was literally going to die, and demanded that he needed some Icy Hot immediately. Immediately!

His back had actually felt weird that day – ah, hindsight is 20/20 – but the real reason for his performance was to send Cody flapping bare-assedly up and down the locker room, Andre, of course, having hid all of the ointment prior. Even this prank failed in the end – _So your back is all right then?_ delivered with tragic earnestness – after which Andre had been forced to admit defeat and go find A-gon to ask who the kid and what his deal was.

Andre sighed. Those had been good times. He found himself studying Cody, first idly, but with increasing interest.

“Did you want something, or?” asked Cody.

He was, Andre decided, entirely too calm. Too relaxed and too comfortable. It wasn’t natural. It was the middle of the postseason, for fuck’s sake. He needed to be messed up, just a little, but the only time Andre had managed that had been – well. Aw, what the hell. “Towel, please,” he said, holding out a hand.

“Sure, I’ll get - “ Cody tried to brush past.

Andre grabbed for him and caught his hip, lingered there an extra heartbeat, then let go, flicking the top of Cody's towel as he went. “What if I want yours?”

Cody’s jaw fell open and his eyes grew two sizes. Taking advantage of his distraction, his towel tuck gave up the ghost for good. He snatched at it a second too late; the towel sagged underneath his fingers and showed off glimpses of his crotch, these tantalizing hints of the wide base of his dick standing out among all this dusty brown fuzz. Nicer than the bare fact of it, for now at least. Andre let the moment stretch so he could savor the way it heightened his anticipation.

Then he held out his hand again; Cody passed over the towel; Andre took it. Watching Cody the whole time, he lifted his arms and very deliberately dried off his hair. Cody’s eyes got even wider. Done and done. He threw the towel away and said, “Yeah?” tilting his head back into the shower area.

Yeah. They walked down the showers, keeping close to the side of the room. The tiles were wet and there were leftover islands of suds here and there on the floor. Every two steps when his toes hit the circular grill of a drain he reached out to the wall and pushed another shower valve all the way open. Water jetted to life behind them, hissing.

At the very end of the room, he stopped and turned around so his back was to the spray. Cody came to a stop in front of him, shifting his weight from one foot to another, looking over at the entrance, once, twice.

“Hey,” said Andre. He almost snapped his fingers but thought better of it. “Focus.”

Cody lowered himself onto first one knee, then the other. Sluicing water falling over the top of Andre’s shoulders hit his face when he tried to look up and he shook his head against it, hair flapping and water flying, and then kept his eyes down. He put his mouth on Andre and started to suck, before breaking out into a fit of coughing.

Andre had never had anyone cough on his dick before. Probably some water had gone down the wrong pipe. But there was Cody, neck bent, kneeling, the freckles on his shoulders, the dimples of his spine stretching down his back, just the top of the round curve of his ass visible from this vantage point. Nice. Add the wet heat and lush pressure of his mouth. The coughing problem solved itself as Andre grew harder and thickened and Cody’s mouth made a tighter seal over him.

Andre let his head roll back; he made some inaudible noises masked by the showers. His legs went weak and he braced himself on Cody’s steady shoulders, stroking his thumbs up and down the back of Cody’s neck while Cody’s mouth and tongue worked at him, over, under, everywhere. Dimly Andre registered his head thunking against the shower wall and his hips pushing up, straining up on his toes, his entire body tensed with his back and feet arched as he came.

Silence. Stillness. To open his eyes right now would take too much energy. Slowly he became aware of the sound of the water again. His fingers had crooked and sparked and drifted during his moment of bliss and now underneath them he could feel Cody’s throat moving. Cracking open one lazy eye, he watched Cody’s Adam’s apple chugging away as he swallowed, manfully, two, three times.

Good. Andre felt good and warm and indulgent deep in his gut and maybe his heart too. He played his index finger lengthwise across the seam of Cody’s lips and sighed. “C’mon, c’mere.” He hauled Cody up by the armpits and they embraced, their bodies wet-sticking against each other; jammed flush between was Cody’s cock, a blunt press that rubbed up hard against Andre’s belly, Cody’s breath heavy and panting in his ear. Andre laughed, short huffs coming from deep in his throat. “Yeah?” he said. “You wanna fuck me?” He snuck his hand into the gap between them, half the nail of his thumb dug into the wet skin of Cody’s groin and the pad pressed against the side of Cody’s cock. Then he pushed, and feeling the hot weight of it swipe across his stomach and then slowly drag back across to cover his bellybutton again was – fucking intense. It left a trail of sensation, of lingering heat, real or imagined, and he wanted more, made a grip with his thumb and forefinger and grabbed the head and pulled up, that heat and that weight again sliding up his body and he wanted it to cover him entire, feel the slight rubbing roughness of the little flap of skin on the underside of Cody’s cock.

Paradoxically all the water made the skin-on-skin feel drier, so he reached back to the wall and pumped out two squirts of shampoo. “Here we go,” he said, pushing Cody back a half step. Then he soaped him up, a rich lather that thickened his pubes into clingy whorls and slicked up the rest of him. “That’s better.” Andre roughly put his arms around Cody’s waist and pulled him back in.

Cody shuddered. He wrapped his arms around Andre’s neck and pressed his hips in tight, slotting up the channel of Andre's groin and smearing a big soapy mess all over Andre’s stomach. Smooth, gliding, thrust, again and again, sucking wet shower kisses onto Andre’s shoulders like he was literally drinking him in.

Andre closed his eyes. He’d been under the spray so long that the needles of water hitting his back faded into the background, didn't hear the sound of them drumming against the tile or even feel wet at all, almost, and contrasted with when Cody came the splash of those few thick drops on his skin was like nothing Andre ever felt before, scorching hot and wet and alive.

All done here. Took less than five minutes.

Andre peeled Cody off and, leading the bull by the horn, so to speak, positioned him underneath the shower for a thorough rinsing-off. With some satisfaction, he saw that Cody was way out of it. Traces of a dreamy smile played at the edges of his lips and crimped two long, almost dimpling, lines into his cheeks. It was cute. Andre felt like whistling and did, which was when he saw, out of the corner of his eye, Cody cutting over a glance with an altogether different kind of smile attached. Kind of – sly. The eyes had some mischief in them. “Hey, you fucker,” said Andre, with a kind of mild, dislocated astonishment that accompanies sudden shifts of perspective. “What are you smirking about?” He wrestled Cody into a headlock, with only minor difficulty.

“Nothing, nothing,” said Cody, laughing inside Andre's arms. “Just happy I guess.” He squirmed away and straightened. By now the shower heads all the way down the line were automatically shutting themselves off, one after another. A sudden hush. Cody headed back to the locker room, looking back over his shoulder only once, to flash Andre a peace sign.

Which served to strengthen the sneaking suspicion inside Andre that, the whole time he thought he'd been given Cody a hard time, he'd actually only been playing right into his hands. So to speak.

Damn.

**

That was how it began. This was how it ended – like most things, late in October. World Series. Cody was 0 for 11 with seven strikeouts, four in the last game alone. And that was just typical, was Andre’s way of thinking, typical of baseball and of life, maybe, that the guy with a charmed rookie season up till now would be made to fail only when he got the biggest stage to fail on. Publicly. Excruciatingly.

Whether it was a simple run of bad luck or actual nerves was hard to say. Certainly the at-bats didn’t look any good, but Cody didn’t seem any different in the clubhouse. Either that or he was putting on a brave front. Still, it was the World Series. Every new out was picked apart and analyzed, three-game trends assembled, micro-splits split down finer and finer until they lost all power. The pressure cooker scrutiny, all the expectations. If it wasn't getting to him now, it might later.

Andre himself was fine. He was enjoying himself. 0 and 1 with a walk so far, but there were a few hits left in him for sure, not that anyone was relying on him for much of anything. Cody, though. Clean up hitter. Dodgers down a game. These things wear on a guy. Cody was only human – not a robot, not a saint. Am I pressing too much? Am I not pressing enough? Am I fucking it all up? Are we going to lose because of me? Everyone else is hitting homers, why not me? And similar inevitable thoughts.

So Cody made a change. Day of Game Four, batting practice. First he watched Andre, more keenly than usual, so that Andre kept getting prickles on the back of his neck and turning his head to see him there, smiling, the chain links of the batting cage casting shadows over his face and making him look like a different, more mysterious person. All day long people had been trying to cheer him up, back slaps, ass pats, vice versa, etc. Normally everyone knew to stay well clear of slumpers – in this brave new world, Andre guessed, where three bad games counted as a slump – but the normal rules didn’t apply for a rookie. Everyone was full to the brim with encouragement and advice, both useless as far as Andre was concerned, but the advice especially so. Half of it was going to contradict the other half, or at least be mutually incompatible.

Well, alright. Andre hung back after finishing his own sets, to see what Cody would do. Which was take batting practice, but without his usual home run uppercut, the tight, controlled violence of that swing and the crazy athletic swivel of his hips. In fact, the batting stance almost – ah. He was imitating Andre. Leaning heavily onto the cage, Andre rattled the links and yelled, “Very funny.”

Cody didn’t look over but his lips curled up. Then he did someone else, looked like – Forsythe. Another veteran lefty. Andre rattled the cage again. “Get on with it already!”

Cody made a dumb salute with his bat in the air and got on with it, returning to his own stance but approaching BP with a tick more patience to let the ball get deeper in on him, not trying to pull it, instead lining thirty balls sharply into left field, one after the other. So that was his game. Well, Andre wasn’t ever going to discourage anyone from emulating their elders. Hopefully it would bring him some joy.

Ok, curiosity satisfied. Andre had seen enough. He went back into the clubhouse, passing by Rich Hill trotting in from the outfield with two handfuls of balls and ignoring the autograph seekers. Time for the game.

Which he wasn’t starting in. He sat on the bench and used his free time to study Cody. A weak little pop fly for his first at-bat. At least it was contact. Then another swinging strikeout on the next. This brought him to 0 for 13, with eight strikeouts. Who even knew what they were saying on the broadcast right now; reporters had already been asking Roberts if he was thinking of sitting Cody. Not ideal.

Cody came slumping back into the dugout. He re-racked his bat, loudly. He got a cup of water and didn’t drink from it, fixing the field with a thousand-yard stare, the cup held between his fingers up by his mouth like a shield to keep anyone from approaching him. And there it was. Now Cody was feeling it. He didn’t look resolute or determined or in any kind of joking mood. He looked frustrated; he looked miserable. It was all over his face and in the lines of his body.

The sight made Andre itch. He wanted to do something about it, say something. But what? _Hey, lay off that shit in the dirt already, Jesus Christ, man, what’s wrong with you?_ Cody knew that already, probably had flashes of the at-bats playing behind his eyelids tormenting him every time he blinked. Whatever the problem was, it wasn’t an issue of thinking too little about it.

What else? _Hey, it’s alright, you’ll get ‘em next time, we believe in you._ And if he didn’t? If he just flailed around shittily for the rest of the series? What then? He would feel like he had let the team and the fans down. The only thing that was going to make Cody feel good was a hit, and the only person that could make that happen was Cody himself.

That left Andre with few options. But he found himself getting up and walking over anyway, still without a firm plan of what he wanted to say, or even what he wanted to accomplish with the saying. Floating around in his head were the shapes of a few big ideas, hazy sentiments about how keeping cool when you were winning was easier than keeping cool when you were losing, about how you can be frustrated but should never dwell, even if there was no success, if it seemed like there would never be success again. The whole name of the game was failure, and Cody would never have tasted it so bitterly before, but he was now, and would a hundred times again. Better learn how to get used to it.

Andre reached the dugout bench. Cody looked up with hope shining bright in his eyes, so obviously desperate to believe Andre could solve his woes with a few words of wisdom and a head pat, as if anything worth solving was ever that easy. Andre’s mind went blank. Then he said, the words coming to him easily and naturally, on the fly, “You might as well not bring a bat up there anymore. You have the same chance,” and went ambling back to his spot on the rail.

It was much too early for Cody to be laughing at his own struggles. But at least there had been a spark, a flash of fire, real anger in his eyes. For a second he hadn’t looked so defeated. And maybe later he could laugh about it. Andre himself didn't know how to feel that, for the first time since he'd met Cody, he'd finally managed to get a rise out of him. It was bittersweet.

From his spot hanging loose and casual on the rail, he watched as Cody went up to the plate, stubbornly still bringing along his bat. It was now the top of the seventh. Andre found himself, with unexpected fierceness, wishing that it didn’t have to be so. Everything he’d been thinking in the moments before was still true. Cody did have to learn how to cope with failure. Everyone did.

But.

Why did it have to be now? After a great season with everything going his way, the ice cream and home runs and new shoes and likely ROY, even the little bit of teasing, just to keep him humble, which ended with five minutes of sex in the locker showers? There was so much time for failure later. He only got to be young once. For his year to end like this was almost cruel. And a shame, too. Andre didn't know if he was getting soft or if Cody had made him soft, but. It was a shame. Cody hadn't gone more than two games without getting on base up until the World Series but if he looked back at his rookie year now there would always be a black mark. Deep, personal regret, the first time in his life he ever felt overmatched and helpless on a baseball field. An imperfect joy.

So, the unexpected fierceness. Something approaching longing. Hoping, up on the rails, leaning in. Cody went up to bat and Andre thought about praying, begging, pleading, God, the Universe, Jobu, anyone and anything, but on second thoughts saw less use in that and more in trusting Cody, so he did that instead. For maybe the first time.

Now was an excellent time to break out. There were men on base and the game was tied. Cody stood in; Andre held his breath; Cody took a ball; Andre breathed out. He was reminding himself that you can't watch the ebb and flow of a baseball game in a state of terrible suspense the entire time when Cody struck the second pitch well to left field. Andre's head swiveled to follow, along with the rest of the dugout, the entire stadium. It became quieter. He saw at a glance the ball wouldn't be caught and turned back for Cody's reaction.

Massive bat flip. Triumphant finger point on the base paths. Looking into the dugout and clapping. Looking into the sky with arms raised, swearing, something like, _Fuck! It's a miracle!_ or any one of its rough equivalents. And then he looked right at Andre, sweaty, his helmet, the shadow it cast to almost hide his eyes.

A thanks? A prayer? A challenge?

A promise?

 _Good,_ thought Andre. _You remember this, no matter what else happens._ And he held out his hand, middle fingers curled in, his thumb and pinky stuck out, for the only surfer he knew from Chandler, Arizona.

Hang loose.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Cody had two doubles that game and the second was the RBI one but I condensed things for the purposes of a better catharsis moment. Reality can be so untidy. We shall not speak of how it deprived me of the true ending I wanted to write.


End file.
